Tuesday, May 14, 2013

Researchers develop synthetic HDL cholesterol nanoparticles

Atherosclerosis, a buildup of cellular plaque in the arteries, remains one of the leading causes of death globally. While high-density lipoprotein, or HDL, the so-called good cholesterol, is transferred to the liver for processing, low-density lipoprotein, or LDL, builds up in the arteries in the form of plaque.

Early detection of cellular components in the plaque that rupture and block arteries have long been held as potentially effective detection for heart diseases and their link to atherosclerosis.

A new study by University of Georgia researchers in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences department of chemistry, published online May 13 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, documents a technological breakthrough: Synthetic high density lipoprotein nanoparticles. A completely biodegradable synthetic version of the so-called good cholesterol, the nanoparticles represent a potential new detection and therapy regimen for atherosclerosis.

Wednesday, March 27, 2013

Carbon Nanotubes making Holograms

Researchers from the University of Cambridge's Department of Engineering have demonstrated the novel utilisation of carbon nanotubes for making high resolution holograms.

Carbon nanotubes - a manmade material - have been the focus of an enormous amount of research during the last decade due to their extraordinary electrical and optical properties. These tubes are many times thinner than a wavelength of visible light which makes them promising candidates for being used as pixels.

Monday, March 18, 2013

A future improvement over flash memory, next-generation nonvolatile memory called Phase-Change Random Access Memory (PRAM), has a operating speed of 1,000 times faster than that of flash memory.

"PRAM uses reversible phase changes between the crystalline (low resistance) and amorphous (high resistance) state of chalcogenide materials, which corresponds to the data "0" and "1," respectively. Although PRAM has been partially commercialized up to 512 Mb by Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd., its writing current should be decreased by at least one-third of its present level for the mass production of mobile electronics applications. A team of Professors Keon Jae Lee and Yeon Sik Jung in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at KAIST has developed phase-change memory with low power consumption (below 1/20th of its present level) by employing self-assembled block copolymer (BCP) silica nanostructures. Their work was published under the title "Self-Assembled Incorporation of Modulated Block Copolymer Nanostructures in Phase-Change Memory for Switching Power Reduction" in the March issue of ACS Nano."

Friday, March 08, 2013

3D Systems Corporation(NYSE:DDD) 3D printing yet again

3D Systems Corporation (DDD) reported earnings on February 25th. The company reported adjusted EPS of $0.39 (before split), a cent over views, but missed revenue expectations, as it reported $101.6 million, and analysts were expecting $103.86 million. Revenue was up 45% over the same quarter last year, and 54% for the year, reaching $354.6 million.

The management said on the conference call that the company introduced 16 new products, and that revenue from new products increased 70% to $131.9 million. Gross margin expanded 390 basis points to 51.2%. Organic growth for the year was 22.4% and 18.8% in the fourth quarter.

Meanwhile the stock continues the downward trend with a possible short term reveral today.

Tuesday, March 05, 2013

Self-assembling Solar-harvesting films

New Research promises cheaper ultra-light thin film solar panels and the basis of a low-cost tool for 3D printing of these thin film circuits.

"Scientists from Imperial College London, working at the Institut Laue-Langevin, have presented a new way of positioning nanoparticles in plastics, with important applications in the production of coatings and photovoltaic material that harvest energy from the sun. The study, presented in Advanced Materials (cover article), used neutrons to understand the role that light – even ambient light – plays in the stabilisation of these notoriously unstable thin films. As a proof of concept the team have shown how the combination of heat and low intensity visible and UV light could in future be used as a precise, low-cost tool for 3D printing of self-assembling, thin-film circuits on these films."

Sunday, March 03, 2013

Quantum Dots

Some nanotechnology related news on the Economist:

"A NEW range of televisions from Sony is the first to use minuscule devices known as quantum dots to produce colours which are more vibrant than those which appear on a conventional liquid-crystal display (LCD). Quantum dots are crystals of semiconductor material just a few nanometres (billionths of a metre) in size. They could have a big future in lighting and display technologies, but are difficult and expensive to manufacture, and use toxic materials. However, Geoffrey Ozin, from the University of Toronto, Uli Lemmer, from the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, in Germany, and their colleagues believe they have found a way to deal with these problems."Read more